Several US Airlines drew fire from the Department of Homeland Security Wednesday over their stance against the Trump Administration’s controversial policy of separating migrant children from their families.
The unusual public stoush came as President Donald Trump on Wednesday directed officials to try to keep detained families together as he bowed to political and public outrage over the policy of separating adults from their children at the US southern border.
American Airlines, United Airlines, Delta Air Lines, Southwest Airlines, and Frontier Airlines asked the government not to use their flights to transport children separated from their families under the policy.
American said the widely-publicized policy was “not at all aligned” with its values.
It said that, like many US carriers, it has contracts to provide federal government travel but the authorities did not disclose information about the nature of the travel.
“While we have carried refugees for non-profits and the government, many of whom are being reunited with family or friends, we have no knowledge that the federal government has used American to transport children who have been separated from their parents due to the recent immigration policy, but we would be extremely disappointed to learn that is the case,’’ it said in a statement.
“We have therefore requested the federal government to immediately refrain from using American for the purpose of transporting children who have been separated from their families due to the current immigration policy.
“We have no desire to be associated with separating families, or worse, to profit from it. We have every expectation the government will comply with our request and we thank them for doing so.”
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United chief executive Oscar Munoz said the airline has not seen any evidence that children separated from their parents were flown on United’s planes.
But the airline had told the government it should not transport migrant children who were separated from their parents on its flights.
“Our company’s shared purpose is to connect people and unite the world,” Munoz said. “This policy and its impact on thousands of children is in deep conflict with that mission and we want no part of it.”
Delta said its mission was to connect people and t was against anything that ran contrary to that mission.
“Recent reports of families being separated are disheartening and do not align with Delta’s core values.,” it said. “We applaud the Administration’s Executive Order resolving the issue of separating children from their families at the U.S. border.”
Southwest also said it had no evidence its flights had been used to transport the children but it had no wish to b involved in separating children from their parents.
The Association of Flight Attendants-CWA, which represents cabin crew in the US, applauded the stance taken by airlines.
“Flight Attendants take pride in the job we do to bring families together,’’ the union said on twitter “@afa_cwa condemns any action to purposefully separate children from their parents.”
But the airlines were attacked by Homeland Security spokesman Tyler Q Houlton, who said it was unfortunate they no longer wanted “to partner with the brave men and women of DHS to protect the traveling public, combat human trafficking, and to swiftly reunite unaccompanied illegal immigrant children with their families”.
“Despite being provided facts on this issue, these airlines clearly do not understand our immigration laws and the long-standing devastating loopholes that have caused the crisis at our southern border,’’ Houlton tweeted.
“Buckling to a false media narrative only exacerbates the problems at our border and puts more children at risk from traffickers. We wish the airlines would instead choose to be part of the solution.”
